It only takes about 30 seconds to reduce about 80% of the caffeine in a cup or pot of tea; and to do it, all you need is water heated at the proper temperature and loose tea.
To get rid of most of the caffeine in tea, place the desired amount of loose tea in a cup or pot and pour in just enough properly heated water to cover the tea leaves. After 30 seconds, pour off all the liquid, but keep the wet tea leaves in the cup or pot. Immediately re-fill with more water and let the tea steep according to its type and your taste. After steeping pour the tea through a tea strainer and serve.
Watch this video from Bigelow Teas to see how easy it is to decaffeinate your own tea. Although the video shows naturally decaffeinating tea using a teabag; but the process is the same for loose tea.
Reducing the caffeine in tea does not diminish its flavor or health benefits. However if you are concerned about caffeine levels, remember that green tea has 25% of the caffeine of coffee; Oolong about 40% and black tea about 50%..
For more information:
Tea 101: What’s the proper steeping time for tea?
Tea 101: What’s the proper amount of tea to use?
Tea 101: What type of water is best for making tea?
Tea 101: What’s the right water temperature for brewing tea?
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Comments
I regret to tell you that this decaff process is a myth. Scientific tests have shown that at the most about 10% to 15% of caffeine will be removed from tea with this process.
It would take approximately a fifteen (15) minute preliminary steeping to remove any significant amount of caffeine -- and that would, of course, destroy the flavour and character of the tea.
Think of it this way: If it were really this easy, why would commercial tea companies spend significant amounts of time and money on the various types of decaffing processes they employ?
Please! If you are sensitive to caffeine, do not rely on this urban legend. Either purchase a commercially decaffed tea, or stick to herbal tisanes that do not contain caffeine.
For more details about this topic, you and your readers are invited to join us at Teamail.net, where you'll find several expert reports about caffeine content in tea in our message archives.
Thank you and happy tea-ing!
JP Badarau, List Admin, Teamai
I'm going to have to agree with the first commenter here. This article would be nice if it were true, but with tea nothing is this simple. Just as caffeine amounts in tea are never static but are highly variable due to every factor in the whole process that brings you the leaf, so also whatever is needed for decaffeinating is going to vary. Even the biggest companies like Lipton can't guarantee the caffeine content of their teas because they're blended from different crops for flavor, not for uniform caffeine content. And all those crop yields are constantly changing, leaving you the consumer with no sure "rule of thumb" to decaffeinate.
This is an urban myth that has been scientifically debunked. Remember there are other brewing choices like Rooibos, a south African herb that contains ZERO caffeine, and other herbs that do not come from the camellia plant aka "tea"
The other urban myth that circulates among tea enthusiasts and suppliers is that green tea has less caffeine than black. This too is in accurate.
While teas has caffeine they are generally lower than equal size cups of coffee and many sugary soft drinks. Enjoy teas potential benefits in a freshly brewed cup.
Individuals may be excused for falling for this myth but reputable tea companies like Bigelow should know better than to perpetrate it. The best data on the 30 second decaff myth is discussed on Cha Dao blogspot. I recommend anyone who is not yet convinced of the fallacy to read it.
Examiner comment does not allow links but for anyone interested please email me and I will send you the link direct.
Nigel at Teacraft dot com
I'm going to dispute both the claims and the counter-claims here. While there doesn't seem to be any solid evidence at all for the claim that 80% of the caffeine is removed in 30 seconds - correct us if we're wrong - the best evidence I've seen regarding actual caffeine levels over time (linked from the Cha Dao entry mentioned above) didn't debunk this convincingly either, only looking at caffeine levels after about 15 minutes! Extrapolation from there to the 30 second level is almost as scientifically dubious as the original claim. Although not quite.
It's also worth clarifying a bit about levels of caffeine in different teas - while your figures may not be far wrong, there's ridiculously little good data on caffeine in different teas *when brewed correctly*. Boiled identically black, oolong, green and white tea all show much the same levels of caffeine (only pu-erh is notably lower)... but you should never boil green or white tea, and brews at lower temperatures do have less.
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